7 Colossal Mistakes Bloggers Make – And It Is KILLING Them

I just recently finished recording about 20 video blog evaluations for people (a bonus offer I had put out there that I was following through on). All in all, it took me probably close to 5 hours to record all of these videos. And, after doing so, I noticed something.

I’m seeing a LOT of the same mistakes being made over and over again.

This isn’t to say that there is only a single way to do things. Surely, there are probably people who would look at this very blog and disagree with some things (and that’s fine). But, my experience in this business speaks for something. Simply put, if you want to build traffic, keep traffic, and make money with a blog – there are certain things you want to not do.

So, after all of these reviews, I want to lay out what I believe are the most common mistakes – in no particular order.

#1 – Using Feedburner For Your “Email List”

I’m amazed how often I see Feedburner being used. Most of you probably know that I’m a big fan of Aweber. However, if you think that I recommend them simply for the affiliate commissions, think again.

Feedburner is not an email list service – they are an RSS feed service. They happen to allow people to subscribe to a feed via email, but this is not the same as a real email list. You cannot send anything to a Feedburner list which you don’t post on your blog. In fact, you can’t do ANYTHING with those email addresses other than send automatic digests of your posts. You can’t write custom emails, set up an autoresponder sequence, set up multiple lists, get any real stats – nothing.

No doubt, the reason so many bloggers use Feedburner is because they like the price tag – free. But, you get what you pay for, and it’ll be hard to build a real business based on freebie tools with essentially no capability. Aweber offers a $1 trial, and for what they provide, their fees are very reasonable. If you find it a huge budget buster, however, consider Mailchimp. They’re not as good as Aweber, in my opinion, and they don’t understand marketers like Aweber does, but you can get a free account for up to 1,000 subscribers and 6,000 emails per month. For a small list, Mailchimp blows the socks off of Feedburner.

You can export your Feedburner list and take it somewhere else. I recommend it.

#2 – Offering No Compelling Reason To Opt-In

I get a lot of people asking me how they can increase their opt-in rate, and too often I find that they’re offering no reason to opt in. In other words, I see calls to action like “Free tips”, “Get my newsletter”, “Get the latest updates” – blah blah blah. Often this is combined with boring opt-in forms with default submit buttons and no color whatsoever.

Of course, if you’re using Feedburner (shame on you), you have no choice in the matter because you can’t DO anything with it. But, if you want to build a real list, then give them a compelling reason to opt in. An ebook, with a cover image, and some text designed to make me WANT that e-book. THEN, maybe I’ll opt in. But, will I opt in for “free tips” or updates? Not in a million years.

I can only venture to think that most bloggers don’t do this because they think it is too hard to make an e-book. Yet, often, these same bloggers have blog posts coming out of their ears. If you’re in that boat, then get your priorities inline. Stop wrtiting so many blog posts and put that energy into an ebook. It is literally as simple as writing a Word doc and printing to PDF. It really isn’t that big a deal.

#3 – Packing WAY Too Much Crap On Screen

Category lists? Few use them to navigate your blog. If the list is long, don’t display it. Just list categories under your blog post titles and NOT in your sidebar.

Archive dropdowns? People aren’t going to navigate your blog using a big, honker dropdown full of a bunch of months. Remove that ugly thing.

Blogrolls? Why?

4 Billion banner ads? Seriously, if you’re going to run ads, try to keep the number of them reasonable. A large number of ads doesn’t increase your monetization.

Bloggers end up using their sidebars as the big catch-all. Don’t know where to put it? Throw it in the sidebar! It is like the blog’s nasty, cluttered garage and I see a lot of blogs need a spring cleaning.

#4 – Using Dark Background Colors

Simply put – the best way to display your content is black text on white background.

I’ve seen many blogs using white on black. One used black on purple. Another used black on blue. Just horrible color combinations for readability.

Not much more to say on this one. Just change your colors.

#5 – Showing Full Posts On The Homepage

I don’t believe it is smart to show full posts on your blog’s homepage. For one, it gives no reason for them to click on anything – and that’s what you WANT them to do. Secondly, it contributes to a high degree of clutter because all these plug-ins people use on their posts (like social sharing links) end up getting repeated OVER AND OVER AGAIN on the homepage.

Use excerpts rather than full posts. Give them a reason to click to read the rest of the post.

Now, when I say this, a lot of people might end up using the default excerpts that WordPress makes. That’s ugly and it often cuts off right in the middle of the sentence. But, in your post editing interface in WordPress, you have an excerpt field (right below the post body). Whatever you put in there will override the default excerpt. So, do it manually! Control your excerpt and word it in such a way that it is compelling and gets people to WANT to see the whole post.

#6 – Not Realizing What Your Goals Are And Designing Accordingly

Most blogs are designed by schizophrenics, or so it would seem. They’re simply not designed with any kind of a purpose in mind.

If you want people to opt into your list, then that’s your goal. You want to offer a compelling reason to opt-in (see above), then place that form into noticeable spots (below your posts, at the top of your sidebar). Yet, I see people who stuff their opt-ins into their sidebar, usually underneath their social media links and RSS feed links – and nowhere else.

If you have your opt-in in other places on your blog, you can get away with maybe having your opt-in form as the second thing on your sidebar. But, for most people, your social links and RSS feed are NOT high priority. So, why are they at the top of your sidebar?

Another example I’ve seen is people using their blog as a business site, yet burying their contact information on a contact page stuffed into the top menu. Again, if you’re a business site, your primary purpose is to GET LEADS. Your site should be designed to make that happen like greased lightning. Your phone number should be on EVERY page of your blog – big and noticeable. If you’re using an email list as a lead generator (and you should be), then your opt-in should be huge and obvious.

#7 – Being Self-Focused And Not Audience-Focused

I evaluated many blogs which were not clear at all what they were about. There was no hook, and clearly no benefit. I, as a reader, had no idea what I would gain by reading that blog.

I think this is a result of the blogger being too focused on themselves, getting tunnel vision about their own blog, and assuming that the rest of the world sees it as you do.

This leads to things like using vague terms to describe something and it just doesn’t communicate. I also see some using tounge-in-cheek phrases as an attempt to be clever, but only they get it (nobody else does). When you, as the blogger, are writing those words, you are internally attaching certain emotions and motivations to those words, not realizing that your reader often does not share those same emotions or motivations. So, vague wording doesn’t do the trick.

Another thing I’ve seen is people using big, fancy words to try to sound sophisticated, but only succeeding in losing the reader in the process. People run away from words they don’t understand (just like you would put a book down if it used a lot of big words). You get high bounce rates that way.

Most bloggers start a blog with a desire to help people. In order to help them, you have to understand where they’re at emotionally and how they understand things. With that knowledge, you can tailor your communication so that it is UNDERSTOOD. Then, traffic goes up and your bounce rate goes down.

You get that knowledge by constant interaction and survey. If your audience isn’t yet big enough to do that internally, then go out on other sites where your target market hangs out and do it there.

A Wrap Up…

I’m going to be releasing all these blog evaluation videos over the coming days on my Youtube Channel. I’ll probably also have those videos here on my blog, too. In some of them, I had to give a little “tough love”. I want to help bloggers succeed and sometimes what I have to say might not be nice. It has to be that way if I’m going to really help. We all sometimes need that outside perspective.

What do you think of these 7 mistakes? Are you making them? Do you have any to add?

Is Your Blog Still Under-Monetized?

Got a Question or Comment?

I was at the Affiliate Summit West 2011 and a speaker on SEO also said to not use the full content of your posts on the home page. He felt it would lead to duplicate content on your site and the Search Engines would penalize your site for it.

Thank you for post – it’s definitely highlighted some things I can change on my blog – for example, the point about showing full posts on the home page… that’s a good one for me and I will be making some changes on that soon.

I’m just going through a re-design of my blog right now, and your post has come in pretty timely

Agreed. The free account with Mailchimp is a nice marketing tool for them, but in the long run, they’re just not the best out there. I know of a few people who swear by Mailchimp, but others who love to tell me how horrible it is. But, I don’t believe I’ve ever heard a bad word about Aweber.

Thanks for the tips, I’ve been working pretty hard on these sorts of things lately. I ended up using Mail Chimp and don’t mind it, but there is obviously a reason why you (and most other web based professionals) use Aweber instead.

I was wondering if you can recommend a good opt in plugin to do something similar to what you have at the bottom of your post? I’m only using the sidebar at the moment, but want to improve this aspect of my site.

Thanks for this, David. I’ve been thinking lately that my sidebar is way too cluttered. Now you’ve motivated me to do something about it. I also need to be more diligent about using excerpts on the home page. I started doing that, but then I guess I got lazy. Bad blogger.

Definitely agree with most of those – most of which I’ve been guilty of at one time or other, but thankfully have cleared most of them.

I’ll be logging into my blog later and taking the ugly categories section from the side roll – been thinking about it for a while, your post tipped me over the edge on that one. So thanks for that, and keep on keeping on.

It isn’t so much the number as it is the combined effect. Today, I reviewed a lot of blogs which had FAR more than me in their sidebar – sometimes with two sidebars. When you have dual sidebars, each one is thin, and the combined effect is clutter. Plus, many were using HUGE tag clouds, category lists that were very long, and other built-in widgets of WordPress that rarely get used. I also saw many sidebars just packed with so many widgets.

So, it isn’t about the number of things. It is about the overall effect. Some blogs can have more stuff than me and still maintain some form of order and purpose.

It isn’t so much the number as it is the combined effect. Today, I reviewed a lot of blogs which had FAR more than me in their sidebar – sometimes with two sidebars. When you have dual sidebars, each one is thin, and the combined effect is clutter. Plus, many were using HUGE tag clouds, category lists that were very long, and other built-in widgets of WordPress that rarely get used. I also saw many sidebars just packed with so many widgets.

So, it isn’t about the number of things. It is about the overall effect. Some blogs can have more stuff than me and still maintain some form of order and purpose.

I currently show my entire posts on my home page and I have been playing around with a few plugins to only show part of the post. I agree that showing the full post on the home page does not give a person a good reason to click and leave a comment.

Dependant on whether you use the New Post editing box, isn’t this function a standard part of WordPress (again assuming most people use this popular platform).

On the editing toolbar you have a “Insert More tag — ALT+SHIFT+T).

This automatically splits your post wherever the cursor is currently placed in the post and will display the upper content on the Blog post page and the lower part of the content on the single post display page.

Typically the single post display page is the page which provides the involvement device as well, ie the comment box whether that be a WP comment box or an added Facebook comment box.

Seems WP already provide the desired functions without resorting to plugins or creating new home pages.

Great Article, I really need to get working on cleaning up some of my sites. But now the question I have is what DO you actually put into your sidebar? Should it just be the 1 goal of the site? ie –> subscribe/buy/whatever?

Yeah, but typically people land on the post itself if you come in from Twitter or something similar.

And the problem is that most people show multiple, full posts on their homepage. Combine that with all the plug-ins they use which anchor various things at the bottom of each post, and you have a lot of duplicate clutter, long scrolling, and overall Christmas-tree effect.

In my view, the only way you can display full post on the homepage and avoid the clutter is to limit it to only one post.

As for that added click, a couple thoughts:
(1) It you weren’t motivated to make that click, then the content wasn’t compelling. And that’s a larger issue.
(2) When you get people clicking on the blog, it is an involvement device. You want that to happen. Look at it like a “commitment and consistency” thing. You want them to be involved enough to at least click. If they’re not willing to do that from a landing page (which is what the homepage of a blog is), then a better job needs to be done at making the content compelling.

Thanks for this Dave, I have been working on my blog designs and have changed some of the things that you addressed here. I guess that means I am on the right road. I also used some of your ideas to tweak my sites. I hope it helps.

On the not showing the whole post on the front page, I recently started doing that and I have found my comments have increased. I use the tag (in html edit on wordpress) to split the post right where I want it.
Thanks again for the advice.
Justin

You hit the nail on the head with this post! It hits home… I agree that many bloggers make the mistake of focusing on themselves and not their audience.

I made the mistake of not having a true sense of direction before starting my blog. My plans didn’t include growing past my initial idea of starting a blog, creating unique content for it, establishing a web presence; and over time, converting potential subscribers/visitors into buyers.

I had tunnel vision…

…because I was so concerned with what “I” was doing, I failed to make a real connection with my audience. At the time, my efforts seemed almost redundant. This post, however, gives me confirmation that I’m on the right track.

I’m currently in the midst of a redesign and I can definitely relate to almost everything you listed here in this post…

I really needed this post, especially as I am breaking almost all of them! The good news is that I hated my template anyway and I’m in the process of altering a new theme and I’ve written notes on all of the things I need to change.

Great post. I am in the process of establishing my web content & copywriting business, using a blog as a vehicle to drive this (currently going through tutorial videos through the BMC :). I haven’t even thought of creating a WordPress theme or design yet because I have been working on creating a killer USP and personal brand, business objectives etc. It’s all to easy for bloogers just to dive in and start a blog with no real thought or strategy. I can honestly say that after listening to you, you have definetely gotten through to me the importance of running it like a business. I would hate to think what I would have done if I had not come across your wonderful program. This post reinforces that and again have picked up some great tips going forward.

Let me explain; my blog discusses 3D and has tutorials, reviews, etc. Images look a lot better on dark backgrounds (though I agree that full black is just a bad idea in most cases), and often white can destroy a mood by being too harsh. It’s entirely possible to have great colour combinations in terms of readability and design whatever your background, depends largely on the purpose.

Also I think it depends on your audience, I’ve been told before that some people really dislike reading on white backgrounds on a screen because it puts strain on their eyes. Whether the white causes it or not is another matter of course, but there’s more than one way to skin a cat. =)

Great post David. I especially agree on your point about the writer writing for the audience. I was guilty of loving my own writing and finally realized it wasn’t written to the reader and his or her emotions. Progress I guess. Thanks.

Great stuff David!!! I think its tough to tackle all this stuff at once. You feel like you NEED all these things, or to use that, and have this and do that. And until you remove one thing, take a step back and look at it and realize, “Yeah, I didn’t need that” then you can move forward.

I’m constantly making tweaks to my site, to declutter and optimize for conversion.

Great, great advice! I have never heard that about Feedburner but I have to say although you have a really great blog (which is why I subscribe) because I have to click to read the post, I just delete it 50% of the time and I worry that people will do the same with my post if they have to click. I subscribe to a fashion blog as well that I really love but if the headline and the paragraph doesn’t feel relevant to me I don’t click and then don’t end up reading her post that day. That’s just real and not because these are not great blogs. Better to just include the whole post in the email, that is the point of subscribing. What are your thoughts on that?

Great points David, I was using the tag to clip my posts at exactly the right place for the front page, but it was clipping my feed as well (WP 3.0.1 / full feed ticked). So I started showing the full post on the home page so it would publish a full feed. I just tried manual excerpts per your suggestion, but nothing changed. I’ve still got the full post on the home page. This is making me nuts.

Super advice David. The “no full posts on home page” really struck home with me. I am going to figure out how to change that right now. Switching from Feedburner is on my list once I do have a compelling offer for opt in. Thanks again!

When it comes to design, my philosophy has always been that everything must have a purpose. If it does not have a compelling enough reason to be there, it needs to go! And often times, that means backing up your decisions with data. You can easily see if people are clicking on those category and archive links in the sidebar. You’re right, they don’t. However, they do often help give a clue about what the site is about. Although, if you have to rely on them to let people know what your site is about, it’s probably not clear enough in the first place (#7).

One thing I’m not totally in agreement with is the dark backgrounds. I think you can do this, but only very skillfully. In order to make a text readable on a dark background, you have to have just the right amount of contrast and line-spacing. Of course, black text on white is the safe bet if you don’t know how to do this.

I’ve just launched a brand new, fully customized re-design of the Virtual Business Lifestyle and had some awesome feedback on it. I can thankfully say I dont think I am doing any of these things currently….

However, I have been terribly guilty of a few in the past. Lucky there are resources, such as yourself, where you can sincerely learn how to get things achieved in a better, less hectic way nowadays.

I think an article like this is evergreen – it will ALWAYS be in fashion, bud.

Thanks for your great tips! Over here (Holland) social media is just starting to BOOM. I’m like a sponge, taking up all the tips from accross the ocean. Still have to start on my blog and am focussing on all the good and the bad things to do before starting my blogging adventure. Thanks a million again.

David – as always, we learn so much from you. A blog, from my observation, is still one of those ‘mystery tools’ – why to have one, how best to use it, and so on. I appreciate your tips – so easy to implement, one step at a time. I particularly appreciate the reminder to be audience focused.

Great tips as always. I never thought of your point of view about only including excerpts. I have always posted the full post on the home page of my blogs. I am definitely going to change that starting today. Thanks!

I loved your post. It certainly got my attention for I was making some of the mistakes you mentioned. My only excuse is I’m new to blogging and haven’t learned all the faux pauxs yet. Thanks for being so blunt.

David, you make some great points here. I’m interested in your comments about removing the Categories and Archives widgets from the sidebar. How do you feel that people navigate through your blog? Is it via the related posts? Perhaps the search function? I’ve always felt the categories widget gives readers a chance to view articles that could be of interest to them, but perhaps not everyone feels this way!

Well, my recommendation of removing categories is really only applicable if you have a big, long list of them. If you have a nice, clean list (let’s say, less than 10 categories total), then its probably OK.

In my experience, people usually land on the blog via a direct post. From there, you have related articles (which will be better targeted to their interest). Then, if they want, the post has categories on it and, perhaps, tags. But, all of that is related to the post they landed on… because they were interested in it.

Just dumping all that into the sidebar in an untargeted nature doesn’t usually do much but add to the clutter. Because people don’t usually randomly surf a blog…. they come out of a particular, focused interest.

Great article as always. I love Aweber, I use it and recommend it. Mailchimp is fair and like you stated, is much better than using Feedburner. I have been guilty of displaying full posts. I gone back and forth between full posts and have used excerpts, but you make a valid point. Thanks and keep up the good work.

Those are great tips. Being somewhat new, but on a continual learning curve and feeling like a beginner, I see where I need to focus. Writing an ebook is something that I know would be helpful. I have a recovery site, know my purpose, and feel good that I’m using Aweber. Even though I’m not a business, I want my blog to be successful from the standpoint of being able to help people and see where it goes from there. Very helpful post and to the point, which is good.

I agree with everything here especially with not showing full posts on homepage. It is totally a turn off for readers because they will get discouraged if they see a long post and if they feel that they may never want to come back to your blog again. So, use plugins that can shorten your post, at least it;s better for them if they see a list of posts with a read more link so they can choose whatever post they want to read.

“Most blogs are designed by schizophrenics, or so it would seem.”:)))
This was the maximum of this month, no…the maximum for this year.:))))
Schizophrenics indeed my friend, indeed…I see a lot of them everyday, they think they are Picasso, Monet of the 21 century… but they dont have a clue of what practical webdesign is.

I’ve often wondered why people use feedburner for an email list, but I always thought maybe they knew something I didn’t about feedburner. As far as aweber, I’m not a fan of theirs, because they don’t have 24/7 support, and there have been a few times I need support and all I got was their answering machine because it was after their work hours.

mailchimp, eh? I’ve never really considered doing an email list. I’d love to monetize & make a business from my website, but I’ve got too many ideas floating around on it. I need to narrow down & get out more in the blogs that are similar to mine. Great ideas! Thank you so much!

In regards to the clutter in the sidebar, I 100% agree. I think at some point we have all been guilty of using it as a “catch all”. However I think there are two important components that should be in every side bar…

1. A way for the visitor to optin to your list.

2. A way for the visitor to connect with you socially.

If that is all you have in the sidebar it will be more effective than any other combination in my opinion.

David, I swear ….. coming over to your site is like a trip to the dentist! You have to go to the dentist, but you know the truth is going to hurt. And with some much great content here on your site, I don’t know which of my teeth I want you to pull first.

That is definitely true, I agree with this post,posting unrelated topics in the blog doesn’t work out also the blog should have a category menu where we can add a topic to the particular stuff,.also explaining the whole thing in the same page seems to be more now a days..

I did few of the main mistakes like not building email list. At the start I just planned to increase blog traffic and sale ad spaces and earn ‘lots’ of money. But now I don’t think it’s a proper way. I must re-create my plan.